


the measure of the sea that surrounded us

by Siria



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Community: mcsmooch, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-25
Updated: 2008-03-25
Packaged: 2017-10-03 20:15:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siria/pseuds/Siria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rodney used to do this a lot when he was a kid--sit outside and watch the stars, or look up through a telescope carefully paid for with many weeks' pocket money at the play of the Pleiades overhead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the measure of the sea that surrounded us

**Author's Note:**

> For tty63, who wanted stargazing.

Rodney used to do this a lot when he was a kid--sit outside and watch the stars, or look up through a telescope carefully paid for with many weeks' pocket money at the play of the Pleiades overhead. Nights like those were what made him want to become an astrophysicist. Never mind what happened to him later: the working models of nuclear bombs, the pleasure of besting Jeannie's mind with his, the look on his father's face when he realised by just how much his son had surpassed him. The stars had come first for five-year-old Mer: sitting on his window-sill far beyond his bedtime, toes growing cold even in his footie pyjamas as he tilted his face up towards a sky filled with shooting stars. It had been terrifying, and oddly reassuring: to watch their bright deaths while overhead, all the universe kept on turning.

He forgot that, sometimes; forgets it still, when so much of his work seems to pull him underground. The concrete depths of the SGC; the glass and metal of Atlantis, folding around him; the airless dark of a Wraith hive--all of it is important work, but so little of it brings him outside himself any more, gives him that sense of pure awe, pulls his gaze upwards from earth to limitless sky.

Ordinary Tuesday nights like this one can remind him: a once in a century meteor shower setting the sky over Atlantis ablaze, glancing against the city's shield in momentary glories of colour before burning itself out over the mainland. Rodney sits on the balcony that curves outwards from John's bedroom, shivering in the cold and watching. His fingers are going numb, curled inside the pockets of his leather jacket, and he can't feel the tip of his nose; when he exhales, a white cloud of his breath obscures the shattering white of the stars for just a moment.

John is a still presence next to him, and warm: a warmth that Rodney can lean into, familiar and reassuring. The beat of John's heart against Rodney's ribcage is so steady and calm, his arm around Rodney's shoulder so tight, that it terrifies Rodney just as much as the sight of a shooting star once did his five-year-old self. John is content when they're together; it seems so natural that it must a constant, _John + Rodney_ an irrefutable law of physics; and part of Rodney will always wonder how that's not a sign that the sky's about to fall.

Tomorrow morning, Rodney will badger John until he gives in and flies them in a jumper to the mainland, to go see the pitted landscape that the meteor shower is carving from the dark earth right now--a moonscape that Rodney will stumble over, the fingers of one hand tangled tight with John's to keep him upright while John crinkles his eyes against the spring sun and makes dorky jokes about Neil Armstrong and _one small step_. For now, though, he's content to sit here with John and watch the stars fall; and when John nudges Rodney, hint of a whine in his voice when he says that it's late and he's cold and they should go to bed, Rodney just turns his head to kiss him with quickly warming lips and a quickly smiling mouth.

_Cold_? Rodney mumbles against John's skin, licking against the rough patch of stubble just underneath John's jawline that he always misses, no matter how carefully he shaves.

_Nuh uh_, John replies, heavy-lidded gaze fixed on Rodney's mouth and his icy hands working their way up underneath Rodney's shirt to warm against his belly--slow and careful movements accompanied by the rustle of cloth and the rasp of their breathing.

_Cool_, Rodney says with a grin, ignoring John's groan of protest at the pun in favour of nipping at his lower lip; cups John's beloved face in his hands and kisses him carefully, over and over, while overhead the stars flare brighter, each and every one.


End file.
